Book Talk #1

International Literature Book Blog

A Ticket Around The World
Written By: Natalia Diaz, Melissa Owens 
Illustrated By: Kim Smith
Published By: Owlkids
Copyright: 2019
Pages: 32
Genre: International Literature 
Reading Level: K-2nd

Overview
This is a story about a young boy who visits his friends in 13 different countries. Each page takes you to a different country. On these pages you will find information about each country like the population total, weather, traditions, and even food that they eat. This is a great story to teach young children about the world around us! I could use this book to teach a social studies standard. An activity I would do would be to have the children pick one of the countries listed in the book and write or tell about why they would want to visit that country. For more advanced students I would have them maybe research a country not mentioned in the book and have them use the book as a guide for their research. 

Diverse Perspective Book Blog

Mama's Nightingale: A Story of Immigration and Separation 

Written by: Edwidge Danticat
Illustrated by: Leslie Staub 
Published by: Penguin Group
Copyright: 2015
Pages: 36
Genre: Diverse Perspective
Reading Level: PreK-2nd

Overview

This story is about a young girl named Saya. Her mom has been taken away and is currently in prison due to immigration reasons. Her father writes multiple letters to the local government petitioning on his wife's release. His letters never got any attention, but as soon as Saya writes one she receives a response and within a week her mother gets brought before a judge. The judge agrees to let Saya's mom out of prison while she waits for her papers to come. This is a wonderful story to teach children about what many families face today. It is also a wonderful story to show just how powerful one voice can be no matter how small. An activity that children could do with this story would be to write about how they would feel if something like this were to happen to them. They could even write their own petition of why his/her mom should be released from prison! I would use this book in 2nd grade to help teach the social studies topic of immigration. 

Sources

https://www.literacyworldwide.org/blog/literacy-daily/2016/01/06/putting-books-to-work-em-mama-s-nightingale-a-story-of-immigration-and-separation-em

https://www.teachingbooks.net/tb.cgi?tid=47104

"Hello, My Name is Octicorn" Book Blog

Hello My Name Is Octicorn

Written by: Kevin Diller and Justin Lowe

Illustrated by: Binny Talib 

Published by: HarperCollins Publishers

Copyright: 2016

Pages: 39

Genre: Picture Book

Reading Level: Kindergarten-2nd

Overview

This sweet story is about an octicorn who is sometimes "too" different. He has a hard time fitting in. This story emphasizes the importance of differences and how we are all unique. You really start to sympathize with Octi and want to become his friend, so he does not have to feel lonely. What a great way to teach children that you should never look down on others just because they are different from you and, although we are different, we are also similar! 

STEAM Lesson

This lesson is another that I am proud of. The children absolutely loved it because they got to paint!! You give a kindergartener some paint and they'll love you forever. Okay, maybe not, but they really did enjoy the lesson. The objective was for them to push and pull, which is a component of a science standard. I threw in some numbers and counting and connected it to math. For technology they simply uploaded a picture of their masterpiece to their class profiles. For engineering they designed their art!! It was actually the most simple lesson I created, and it seemed to be the most fun!

Here are a few examples of the artwork the children created! We used red and yellow paint which created an orange color. We used small pieces of cardboard squares to push and pull paint. I wish I could share the pictures of how much fun the children had while completing this lesson. I cannot wait to further my experience as an educator in my upcoming semesters!!

Phonemic Awareness Lesson

This was probably the simplest lesson I completed this semester. It was extremely beneficial and important though.

This was the set-up of my lesson. I used elkonin boxes and play-doh. I am aware that print is not a component of phonemic awareness, but my cooperating teacher asked that I incorporate them in some way because she wanted the children to get familiar with putting the letters with the sounds. As we sounded out our words, we would touch the play-doh that corresponded with the sound. The children loved getting to use the play-doh and I saw that it helped them to determine the beginning, middle, and ending sounds of words. This is often a difficult task for a kindergartener and somehow the play-doh and the elkonin boxes made it easier to understand.

Math Lesson

Okay, now this lesson is probably the one I am most proud of for this semester. It took a good bit of planning and a good bit of work to prepare, but oh my gosh it was so worth it. I'll get to the point!! My math lesson was given just a few days before Halloween, so I had to make that connection! I printed, laminated, and cut out like 200 pieces of these pretend pieces of candy. Here take a look!

So that was my kitchen floor after cutting them all out... I also had the children decorate their own little candy bags (a paper sack) to use for my lesson. I can't upload a picture of the bags because they loved them so much, I let them keep them and I do not have a picture without the children in them. I will however show you what the inside of the bags looked like.

I had the children count out 10 pieces of the pretend candy and place it in their bags. You would have thought that it was real candy. I mean they loved it! Because of this I let them keep everything and even brought them a couple of real pieces of candy to go with it. This lesson was so much fun because the children enjoyed it and because of this I am going to be sure to create more lessons like this in the future!